


Bitter Ash

by VespidaeQueen



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene, pre-game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-07
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-16 16:18:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3494888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VespidaeQueen/pseuds/VespidaeQueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is far to easy to bend the truth; to tell just enough to mask a lie. Solas examines the Anchor and keeps far too much to himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bitter Ash

He examines the woman with an air of clinical detachment, but inside he is anything but. The Seeker and the Chantry sister stand in the shadows, and the soldiers positioned around the room remind him that a wrong move could mean - well. Death, but likely not for whom they would intend it. Which is not the outcome he desires; he has no intention of killing today, not unless it becomes necessary.

“Well?” In the light of the torches, the seeker’s face is even more defined than when he saw it in daylight earlier. Shadows make sharp lines of her face, and there is tension in the set of her jaw, the press of her lips.

“Patience, Seeker,” he says mildly. “It will take more than a moment to understand what this is. It is unlike anything I have seen before.”

That is not _precisely_ a lie. Just a simple bending of the truth. The Seeker accepts it, though a noise formed in the back of her throat tells him that it is not _quite_ the answer she wanted.

Still, this does not deter him. The sole survivor of the explosion lies before him, and with her lies - hopefully - answers.

More likely, more questions.

She lies still for now, but he has already seen how magic pulls at her. The Veil has been torn - he has seen the tear in the sky. Around her, the Veil feels thin as well, and her hand -

The world shakes and magic lashes out. Bright and green, it spills from her like little tears in reality. A cry, the strain of muscles; sweat beads on her forehead, but she does not wake.

And how could she? This magic was never intended for someone like her. The magic of gods, somehow bestowed upon someone who cannot even fathom what this world once was.

It wasn’t intended for the magister, either. It is a comfort to know that he perished in the explosion.

“ _Solas_.”

The Seeker speaks the name he had given her once again, and the ghost of a smile tugs at his lips. _Solas_. It is a fitting name, he thinks, that he has given to himself. Something of a joke, something of a benediction, something of a curse.

“I can tell you very little if I am not allowed time to examine her,” Solas says, but he rocks back on his heels, tilts his head up to lock his gaze with hers. Her face is cut like stone; a muscle beats in her jaw. “Very well, if you insist. As far as I can determine, the magic in her hand is the same that tore the breach in the sky. It would appear that they are connected -”

As though timed, the world shakes around them once more and magic flares. A breath is ripped from the woman, and he watches a thread of light snake up a vein in her wrist.

“It is also killing her,” he says as she stills once more. His fingers on her skin feel the flutter of her pulse, the fever-tinge of magic on her skin. “Every time the breach opens further, this mark in her hand grows larger.”

The Seeker turns to the woman at her side. “Have you learned anything at all about her, Leliana?” she says in a low tone. Leliana’s face is in shadow - the Left Hand of the Divine, ever hidden - but he sees her shake her head.

“Nothing. We have no name, no way of knowing who she is. We only know that she was at the Conclave, and that she is Dalish.”

“Do we know if she is a mage?”

It would, perhaps, be reasonable to say nothing. In this case, he does not stay silent. The tenuous balance in the room, the small measure of trust that they have placed in him - better to further that, here and now. Tell truths to make the lies more easily swallowed.

“Yes,” he says, drawing the attention of both women back to himself. “I can tell as much. It may explain why the magic has tied itself to her in such a way.”

Another thing that is nearly a lie. In truth, he does not know _why_ this has happened. It could be because she is a mage, it could also very well be because she is an elf. But he is doubtful of even those as explanations. A thousand years and more the magic has been locked away, and unleashed by a magister...perhaps she was simply at the center of the explosion, the epicenter of the magical catastrophe.

The Seeker begins to speak quickly, her voice rough and harsh. There is anger there - mages, the Divine dead, the temple destroyed. But he only half listens to her, his attention instead upon at the woman before him, the magic in her hand faded for the moment.

She is like every other Dalish he has met; there is nothing to set her apart. She lies there on the ground, a shadow of what was once an elf, thousands of years removed from what once was. Upon her cheeks, the markings of Mythal cut so deeply that they look like scars, reminders of a history that her people do not remember. Knotted, messy hair, smudges beneath her eyes, bits of the Fade still clinging to her. She is entirely unremarkable, except that she lives.

And that, in truth, makes her _entirely_ remarkable.

A puzzle, and one that he would likely enjoy more if it wasn’t for the world unraveling around them.

He stares at her hand, and he can feel the magic contained within it. Old, ancient, and very familiar. The magic is expected, it’s location is not. What he would give for a fraction of the time he once could have taken to examine something like this, to ponder the hows and the whys of what had occurred.

“I will need more time,” he says, cutting through the discussion that grows heated behind him. “I believe I can determine what this connection between the breach and this mark is, but I need more _time._ And some peace and quiet.”

It is a pointed comment, and the Seeker’s eyes narrow. But a moment later she nods. There are murmured words once again, orders spoken to the guards. She and the Left Hand depart the room, and Solas is left alone, save for several guards.

Not ideal, but better. He turns the woman’s hand over, baring her palm. For a moment, he presses his fingers there, spins threads of magic through her. They coil and wind and then he _tugs_ \- and nothing.

Another failure, then. The magic is very much part of her now, permanent, etched into her bones. And without the foci, he has no way to stop the breach from tearing the world apart. This was not the plan; this is now how it was meant to be.

He could go away, he thinks for a brief moment. That was one of the stories they told about him, wasn’t it? A lone god, hidden away at the edge of the world, laughing to himself over all the destruction he had caused. The edge of the world had a nice sound to it, but he knows that if the breach isn’t closed…

He has nothing against tearing down the veil, but it was not supposed to happen like this.

But he can salvage this, somehow. Failure is a bitter taste that he does not like, and so he will _fix_ this so that it suits his plans. He can make this work.

Somehow.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this about a month and a half ago, and the forgot that I had finished it. I found it today, cleaned it up, and decided to post it.
> 
> Same Lavellan as in [Splinter and Spite](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3150062).


End file.
